Blue Pike Story

[Jimdski]

The disappearance of the Blue Pike from the sport fishing catches was the result of the uncontrolled numbers of smelt in Lake  Erie. Stocked  by the Michigan Fish Agency in a lake Michigan waters as a food source for the Lake Trout fishery. They migrated to Lake Erie and decimated most Blue Pike reproduction around the year 1955. The smelt numbers consumed all the Blue Pike until the mid  1960"s when the Ontario Fish Agency opened trawler fishery for smelt control  and Lake Erie was termed a dead lake for sport fishing. The smelt were packed up in iced containers and shipped to China by Kalitta Air at Detroit 747 air freighters. Although the bass, perch and walleyes returned by the mid 1960's, the blue pike were gone forever. Nightime fishing for blue pike was from small boats equipped with a couple of Coleman white gas lanterns that attracted schools of emerald shiners around the lights. The minnows attracted the blue pike and supplied the emeralds as bait where the blues were attracted by the bait that folllowed the bait odors under the anchored boats. After dark cities of boats were offshore in 55 foot of cold waters when dozens of blue pike were taken to feed the local families. Commercial tugs  were used with gill nets to harvest the Blue pike and perch. Dunkirk harbor had two hundred tugs working there then. The Erie Railroad built a line to Dunkirk to ship the catch to the East Coast Cities An ice house was constructed there to ship box cars out and local men were contracted to cut Lake Erie ice in the winter. Today the yellow Perch numbers are high enough to land several hundred perch daily but the processing of the catch is a chore at the end of the day. Packing coolers of ice to protect the perch does not happen today.

[Jimdski]

Whitefish were the main target of commercial Lake Erie fish landings. The Irish Canal builders disassmbled their wives table linens to use the fine threads to assemble the gill net meshes into a size to target the whitefish when they schooled up to spawn in late fall on hard bottom waters. The linen threads were dried up to prevent rot 0n damp threads. Large spools were wrapped up to dry in the sun and breezes, Nylon plastic threads were unavailable then. Damp nets were stored in the trays since net rot did not happen now. Trap nets were chicken wire mesh weignted with rocks to hold the bottom and the wall of meshes directed the fish into the holding traps. Today traps nets are weighted with led weights to the bottom and anchored with steel anchors to lead the fish into the trapped areas. They are used to the Barcelona shore line as unwanted or protected species can be released alive. Shallow waters in the western Lake Areas are used after the meshes are dipped in asphalt to enlarge the mesh to direct the fish to the hearts of the trap. The nets are raised over the open stern deck areas to remove the catch. Trap nets were used in Alaskan waters where a 122 pound King Salmon was taken They were held in place by lines of pilings were placed from shore lines to deeper depths where migrating salmon were traveling to spawn. Nearby canneries were placed where the salmon are cooked in steam and cans which you find on your grocers shelves and do not need refrigeration.